


Lone Wolf

by SSJandTechno



Category: The Witcher (TV)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Geralt-typical swearing, Implied/Referenced Prostitution, Jaskier singing a lot, Witcher witching, off screen sex, srsly this is much milder than the show
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-05
Updated: 2020-05-02
Packaged: 2021-02-28 20:09:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 12
Words: 17,061
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23492986
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SSJandTechno/pseuds/SSJandTechno
Summary: Witchers ride from town to town, looking for creatures to kill for coin. Witchers ride alone. Or, rather, Witchers are supposed to. Even creatures as rare as Witchers must meet one another every so often, and Jaskier is eternally willing to 'help'. Not intended as Geraskier, but you could probably read it that way if you like.
Comments: 12
Kudos: 23





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> First chapter is a prologue, skip if you're short on time/impatient, but one paragraph in about chapter 11 won't make sense.

The first sign was sound. Galloping hooves from ahead, coming closer. Geralt touched his heel to Roach’s left flank. She moved out of the middle of the road, but kept walking. The hooves grew closer. Only one horse, a stride length not that different to Roach’s. The wind was behind him, so there was no scent yet. Then there was a horse. A big dapple beast galloping up the hill, its rider hooded and cloaked. Geralt did not stare. He kept to the side of the road, kept his speed the same, he did nothing to be read as a threat. The horse passed him and Roach before he heard the horse pull up, scattering stones. 

He looked back. The rider was wheeling the horse and coming back down the hill towards him. He wheeled Roach. He had no desire to be hit from behind. He put a hand to his steel.  
“Witcher.”  
“I will not start a fight with you, but I will end one.”  
“Witcher, I mean you no harm.” The voice was high for a man, but low for a woman, and the rider’s clothing hid their figure. "Will you not share a fire with me for the evening?”  
Those were words that seldom went together. Geralt felt his hackles stand up. “What do you want from me?”   
“Only your words and your company, Witcher. I offer you the bond of hospitality. ”   
He did not take his hand off the hilt of his sword. “Show me your face.” The other rider hesitated. Their clothing was black, from hood to boots, Geralt could see leather pauldrons under the cloth, and bracers underneath long gloves, but no insignia. No medals, no marks, no kingdom’s stamp on the armour. Whoever this was, they did not want to be known. “You say you want a Witcher for his company, you offer the bond of hospitality, but you cannot have a hearth here.”  
“You may share my food and my fire.”  
“Show me your face.” The rider hesitated again, then took one hand from the horse’s reins and took down the hood. Another pair of yellow eyes stared back in to Geralt’s, but from under a brow that could only belong to a woman.  
“Cat.” He said softly. Suddenly all made sense. Little bound Witchers now, but it was only good sense to trade news and warnings when they did meet. The Cats had tried to train women, a few had made it, but as Witchers differ from mortal men, she-Witchers differ from mortal women. He’d never met one before.  
“Wolf.” She replied. “Will you talk now?”   
Geralt took his hand off his sword. “Where’s your medallion?”  
“And being a Wolf, you must wear it always.” She put a hand under her clothing and pulled a medallion out. It looked genuine to Geralt.   
“Being a Cat, you hide it.”  
She stared at him a moment. “Will you share my fire or not?”  
Geralt looked up. The sky was starting to darken, he could probably make Mariboe tonight if he pushed Roach hard, but he was in no hurry. And, cat or not, he saw other Witchers rarely enough that this one probably was worth listening to. 

Geralt started setting up camp, a little way down from the road, while the cat went hunting. He’d watered both horses and picketed them to graze, and had a fire going by the time he heard her coming back. He couldn’t stop himself reaching for his sword before he had clear sight of her. Then she emerged from the brush, a headless pheasant dangling from one hand. She held it, and her empty hand, up as their eyes met.   
“Wary, aren’t you?”  
“Says one who hides her mark and her eyes.”   
“Wouldn’t it just make your life easier sometimes?” Geralt didn’t reply. Those who knew enough about Witchers would treat this woman with more suspicion than they did him. The Code meant nothing to Cats. “You’re Geralt of Rivia, aren’t you?”  
“And you are?”  
“Lyuba of Gulera. You’re earning quite a name for yourself.”  
“Not by choice.”  
“I’ve heard men singing about you fighting elves as far south as Cintra.”  
“The song is mostly horse shit.”  
“You seem to be popular as a source of stories. There was a little man with a lute asking after you a town or two South of here.” Lyuba drove the stick Geralt handed her through the bird. “I punched him.”  
“He probably deserved it.”

They sat down on opposite sides of the fire, both of their swords still in reach.  
“So, where are you bound, Geralt of Rivia? Are you bound for a hunt or returning from one?”  
“Returning. I was in Redania for a Nightwraith.”  
“It’s been a while since I fought one of those.” Geralt didn’t ask how long it had been since this woman had used her silver at all. “And now?”  
“Who knows? I wander until I hear of someone in search of a Witcher. You?”  
“I’m for Novigrad and a Selkimore.”  
“They know what it is?”  
“Well, it sounds like a Selkimore." Geralt waited. “Thing in the water holeing boats and swallowing sailors whole.” Something about her tone bothered Geralt. Whether it was actually a good idea to look for the lie… maybe not. “How many like us have you seen in the past year, would you say?”  
That jarred. “One dead, and you.”  
“One dead?”  
“A Wolf, I didn’t know him.”  
“What killed him?”  
“Striga.”  
“Is the Striga still-“  
“No.”  
“Good. Did you kill it?”  
“No, I lifted the curse.”  
“How do you lift a Striga’s curse?”  
“By keeping her out of her crypt until dawn.” She said nothing, just looked at him with sudden respect. “You?”  
She took a breath slowly. “I passed one with a Bear’s mark, didn’t get his name, a Manticore called Gerring of Kharkiv. I can’t rule out passing others who didn’t show their marks.”  
“Most of us don’t try to hide what we are. The Code still means something to most of us, and it goes some way to protecting us. Most people with any power know I won’t be hired as an assassin.”  
“Oh, don’t lecture me, Butcher of Blaviken.” Geralt looked up at her sharply. “Yes, I know about that. Wolves wedded to their precious Code, you still massacred men in the market, why is it worse to be paid for it?”   
Geralt stood. “If that’s what you think, you know nothing. If eight come at me with swords in broad daylight, I will defend myself, whatever a mage says about me afterwards.” The Cat didn’t flinch, but her right hand wasn’t on her knee any more.  
“Have I touched a nerve, Wolf?” Geralt just stared at her coldly. “Sit down, or leave the fire.” Geralt didn’t move. “Will you say that men are not often more monstrous than the things you are contracted to kill? Is a man who beats his wife so viciously that she miscarries any better than a Botchling?”  
“And is it wife beaters you’re contracted to kill?” Geralt could see her hand again, so he knelt down by the fire.   
“I do what I must to survive.” Geralt thought it probably wasn’t in his interests to ask why, if other Witchers made a living of sorts hunting monsters, she couldn’t.

Neither of them said anything until the bird was cooked, and that was only to say it was so, and share hard tack and Lyuba’s portion of a dried southern fruit that Geralt didn’t recognise.   
“Have you potions to trade?” Lyuba asked when the bird was mostly bones. “I’ve White Honey, more than I’m likely to use.”  
Geralt grunted and went to his bag. There were things he had that he wasn’t willing to trade away. “I have a Bindweed I can spare, and probably a Tawny Owl.”  
“Two for two?”  
“Fair.” Geralt took the two potions in one hand and held out the other for the White Honey. The cat played fair.   
“Ingredients?”

Geralt didn’t want to lie down to sleep six feet from the Cat. So he didn’t. Once they were done to-and-fro-ing over bits of herb and bits of monster, the Cat lay down to sleep, Geralt knelt as though to meditate. She muttered something about never having the patience for that. He didn’t reply. He waited nearly an hour until the fire was burning low and the Cat’s breathing was slow and rhythmic. Then he lay down, hoping the she-Witcher had the honesty not to kill him if she woke first. 

Geralt woke alive, at almost exactly the same time as the Cat. They struck camp in near silence. She turned North to kill whatever she was going to kill – probably not a Selkimore – he turned South to… who knew? There was never a plan.


	2. Mariboe's dead

Geralt came in sight of Mariboe a little before noon. He could stop here a day or two if he pleased. A highwayman had ridden up behind him two weeks before, put a blade at his back, and demanded that Geralt hand over his money or his life. The result of this had been Geralt gaining a meager coin purse, and a cheap sword and a gelding to sell.   
Roach pulled up sharply in front of the ford.   
“Come on, you’ve done this ford before.” She didn’t move. “It’s not even in spate.” He touched his heels to her. “Come on.” She laid her ears back. “Roach, get on.” He smacked her across the quarters with one hand. She jumped forwards, landed in the middle of the river, then plunged forwards, ears still pinned back. She bucked a little as she cleared the water, pushing her head high as though she was about to bolt. Geralt let his breath go and looked around. “What was that about then, you silly girl?” The problem with horses was that they saw everything. Sometimes, particularly by night, Roach would shy before he saw something coming, but it was nearly noon. There was nothing. All Geralt could hear close to was rushing water and birdsong, the noise of the town was further away. The river smelled as he would have expected a river shortly downstream of a town to smell. He got off his horse. “Now, don’t be a twit.” He started to lead her up the hill towards town. 

It troubled him, though. Roach was not usually a flighty horse. He’d put dead monsters on her back, that would make most beasts buck. For all he tried to keep her out of danger, he had fought a Devourer from her back once. She’d squealed and shaken, but she hadn’t bolted. He’d expected her to. 

If there was anything to it, he’d be told soon enough. Maybe it had just been the glare of the sun on the water in her eyes. 

He felt people staring at him before he reached the first buildings. It didn’t take long to turn to whispering behind hands, then pointing. He ignored them. If someone wanted to speak to him, they could speak to him. But Jaskier had been through here. That tended to make people stare at him.  
Geralt hitched Roach to a post outside the inn, Six White Horses, and went for the door. Even before he opened it, he could hear somebody singing inside. As he stepped inside the nearly empty bar, he recognised the voice.   
“Some like a girl who is pretty in the face,”  
Geralt ignored him, and walked up to the bar.  
“Others like a girl who is slender in the waist,”  
“Stabling for a mare, food and a bed for a man.”  
“But I like a girl who will wrig- Geralt of Rivia!” The lute stopped and Geralt heard running footsteps from the corner of the bar.  
“You heard our call then, Witcher.” The barman said.  
“Honestly, no.”  
“It’s destiny, then. You were meant to help us.”  
Jaskier clapped Geralt on the shoulder. “Reeve wants to see you, Geralt. Something’s eating people.”  
Geralt looked back at the barman. “Hold the food then,” He pulled out a small handful of coin and set it on the bar- “but see to the mare.” – and turned to follow Jaskier out.   
“How long are you staying?”  
“Depends what’s eating people. Who blacked your eye?”  
“A very rude woman.”   
Geralt smirked.

Jaskier opened the door and left it for Geralt. He swung his lute around to his front and drew a breath.  
“Toss a coin to your Witcher,” Geralt sighed heavily. Jaskier ignored him.  
“O valley of plenty, O valley of plenty, O  
Toss a coin to your Witcher,   
I told you he’d come!”  
People were watching them. That made Jaskier happy. It was a portent of a very good night, assuming Geralt did his part. Which he would. He was Geralt of Rivia, legendary hero.   
It only took about four repeats of the chorus to get to the Reeve’s house, the only three-story building in this village, and with more stone than anyone else’s. Geralt thumped twice on the door. Jaskier stopped singing. The door opened.   
“Geralt of Rivia.” Now that was a pretty face. A young girl, fair hair in plaits, unmarked skin, and eyes the colour of the midday sky. She curtseyed. “The White Wolf.” She looked awestruck. If Geralt wanted to get under her skirts, all he’d need to do, probably, was kiss her hand and tell her she was pretty. The world was so unfair sometimes.   
“The Reeve?” Geralt asked. Really, he had no grace.   
“My father.” Of course. Best looking girl he’d seen in this place so far had a powerful father. “Come in, he bade me make you welcome.”  
The Reeve’s house showed his status in every detail. It was probably the only place in town that might consider hiring a musician for a private gig, but probably even this place wasn’t rich enough. Bar tips then. Oh well. Geralt ought to be a good draw.   
“May I ask your name, pretty one?”  
She blushed a little and dipped her head. “Zofia. And you are Jaskier, The White Wolf’s herald. Please, sit, both of you.” She gestured to a long table. Geralt shot Jaskier a questioning look. “My father will not be long.”  
Zofia scampered out by another door.  
“I didn’t call myself that.” Jaskier said as they sat down. “That just happened.” Geralt didn’t reply. The man was very hard to have conversations with sometimes.   
After a moment, Zofia came back with two mugs of something. Jaskier kept his eyes on her as she leant forward to set the mugs on the table, and was rewarded. “Thank you kindly, Zofia.” She blushed again. Geralt grunted in acknowledgement and took a mouthful of whatever was in the mugs as Zofia retreated, shutting the door behind herself. That would take work.   
“Small beer.” Geralt said, eyeing the mug.   
“Well, if they’re hiring you to kill something, they don’t want you drunk, do they?”  
Geralt grunted in assent and took another mouthful. Jaskier considered himself something of an expert at interpreting Geralt’s grunts.   
“So what do you think it is?”  
“All you’ve told me is that something’s eating people.”  
“And that’s too vague?”   
Geralt nodded. “Anything from a bear to an Ekimmara.”  
“What’s an Ekimmara?”  
“Lower vampire.”  
“Don’t vampires just… bleed people rather than eating them?”  
Geralt gave an odd half-laugh. “Only in songs. Most lower vampires don’t leave their meals looking much like humans.”  
That wasn’t a pleasant thought. “Right.”

Another door opened. A man stood there. Jaskier stood up. Geralt didn’t, of course.   
“Geralt of Rivia, thank you for hearing our call.” Jaskier supposed he would have to get used to being ignored in Geralt’s presence. The man was older than Jaskier had guessed, probably nearing his seventh decade, and much wider than he had been in his youth. He was balding, and he gave Jaskier cause to wonder where that girl had got her good looks from. It seemed to take the Reeve a second to realise that Geralt wasn’t going to reply. “My name is Alesky of Mariboe, we need your help.” He sat down. Geralt still didn’t answer. “Seven have died now, and traders fear to cross the water.” Geralt tilted his head. The Reeve seemed to have run out of things to say.  
“So tell me about the killings.” Geralt said, without a shred of sympathy, or enthusiasm. Jaskier thought he’d better not get his book out and write details down.   
The Reeve drew a breath slowly. “It started about a month ago; two girls about Zofia’s age went down to the river to bathe and never came back. Then a herd boy about a week later, went to water his pigs, the pigs came back in a frenzy, the boy we never found.”  
“Any pigs taken?”  
“Three. We found one of their carcasses, gutted.”  
“What were its injuries?”  
The Reeve blinked at Geralt. “It was gutted, Witcher.” Geralt grunted softly and took another draft of beer, still looking at the Reeve. “Then two in one night, a farmer called Jacek, he was seen leaving the inn going towards the river, then never since, and Minka, the baker’s wife.” Star-crossed lovers, Jaskier decided. Never mind that Minka had been another man’s wife. A lonely widow looking to find love again would be better. “A trade caravan found her hand, with her ring on it, by the ford. After that people started avoiding the river, but a gypsy’s boots washed up in the ford the night after he left town, with his feet still in them, and a young lad being chased away from some misdemeanour or other jumped in to the water. The two chasing him saw thrashing and the water being churned up, the lad never came up for air.” Geralt sat back. “We are, of course, willing to pay you handsomely, Witcher, how much-”  
“Give me today to work out what it is, I’ll come back at sundown to discuss payment.”  
Geralt stood up and walked out – the man really had no grace. Jaskier got to his feet, clasped his hands together, thanked the Reeve warmly for the beer, even if it was small beer, and trotted out after Geralt.

“So what do you think it is?”  
“Don’t know. Could be a young Glustyworp, young Amphisbaena, never seen one in a river though, a pack of Drowners that are getting brave, Ilyocori…” He tailed off. He was walking back towards the inn, rather than straight for the river.  
“So you think it’s in the river then?”  
“Makes sense.”  
Geralt did turn in to the yard of the inn, he seemed to be looking for his horse. He stopped, leaning over a stable door.  
“Come on Roach, up you get.” Jaskier heard the animal move. “Sorry I didn’t believe you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please review. This is a new environment for me and I'm still working out what works


	3. Mariboe's river

“Geralt, are you worried at all?” Geralt didn’t look up at Jaskier, who’d called down from high on the bank.  
“I’m not going to go deep.” He called back. He was up to his knees in river water, thirty paces up-river from the ford. Roach had still not wanted to put even one hoof in the water. Geralt couldn’t smell anything apart from river. He couldn’t hear anything unusual, so he was walking slowly upriver, keeping within an arm’s reach of the bank, just in case, and keeping out of very fast moving water, hoping he could see something. 

About ten paces later he gave up, wishing Roach could just tell him what she’d noticed. 

He walked up-river, leading Roach in hand, Jaskier following behind. Roach went quietly for about a mile, the river curved around the village, then suddenly shied. Geralt stopped and looked about. The river had cut itself quite a deep channel here, the water was rushing from a pool just ahead. Nothing was moving, but there was a rank smell, stagnant water. Was there a pool for that smell to be coming from? Geralt let Roach’s rope slip through his and took a couple of paces forwards. Roach squealed and bolted back towards Jaskier, she wouldn’t go far.  
“Geralt?”  
“Shut up.”  
Geralt leant down and put a hand to the ground. There was a tremor. A very slight tremor, getting stronger.  
“Agh!” Geralt jumped upright and dashed back. There was a tree. He jumped and caught a branch.   
“Geralt?”  
“Don’t move. That’s not an Amphisbaena. Or an Illyocoris.”  
“So it’s drowners or…”  
“A Glustyworp.” Geralt shifted in the tree and leant out, looking back towards the river. The pool upriver had low banks by comparison, it looked like animals went there to water. But the ground looked disturbed, as though whatever he’d felt burrowing had burst out. If it was a drowner, there would be tracks. If it was a Glustyworp, there’d just be a slug trail back to water. At this distance, Geralt couldn’t see either. He drew his steel and let himself down as gently as he could. He padded towards the disturbed ground, almost holding his breath. 

Nothing happened. He could see no Glustyworp trail, and those were the paces of a thing with two legs, but footprints the wrong shape to be human. Drowners. 

Geralt padded back to Roach and Jaskier, just as carefully, steel still in his hand.  
“Clever girl.” He said softly, picking Roach’s rope up again. She seemed only too happy to follow him away from the water.  
“What… happened?” Jaskier asked after a couple of minutes.  
“Something was burrowing. Roach noticed first. Running is almost always faster than burrowing, and most burrowers can’t get you if you’re in a tree.”  
“Then you got out of the tree…”  
“Tracks. They’re drowners. Which explains why they left more of the pig than they did the humans.”  
“Drowners like human flesh?” A pause. “So what now?”  
“Tell the Reeve.” And probably try to make Swallow, and see if he could remember what blade oil to use for drowners. 

The Reeve didn’t drive too hard a bargain. He was desperate, and only too happy to pay on delivery of drowner corpses. Geralt spent the rest of the daylight hours scouring the bushes for Ginaitia flowers and haggling with a housewife for white vinegar. He had a little bit of Quicksilver solution left. He bought a small measure of cheap vodka from the barman, who asked if it was for sailor’s courage, and set about some very crude alchemy. Giving Swallow to most people would just make them vomit it back. It would prompt Geralt’s body to heal, in small doses. Drowners fought in packs, and probably wouldn’t all arrive at once, so the fight ahead would probably be long and staged. 

Jaskier was entertaining a small crowd by the time Geralt finished his potion. They were glancing at him expectantly from time to time. Geralt did not appreciate that. He stood up. Dusk was already far advanced. Drowners were active at dawn and dusk, and he’d rather not walk in to their midst as they were at their strongest.   
Jaskier’s crowd was staring at him.   
“Are you going, Geralt?” Jaskier asked.  
Geralt shook his head. “Dawn. I’m going to bed for a few hours.”  
Jaskier raised a hand. “See you in the morning then.”

Geralt didn’t sleep well. He hadn’t expected to. The hunt was hanging over him. But in the small hours, when midnight was passed but there was still barely a hint of light to the East, he felt better for at least having lain down and been still. He rolled out of his cot and armoured himself. He checked his potions and set out, stepping over Jaskier in the bar. The bard had, apparently, forgotten to go to bed. Geralt opened the door.  
“Now?” Geralt jumped. “You’re going now?” Jaskier was pushing himself up, obviously still half asleep. Geralt kept walking. “Alright, hold up.” He didn’t need Roach, he knew where he was going this time. He picked up a rake from outside a stable. Then he noticed Jaskier.  
“What are you doing?”  
“Coming with you.”  
“No.”  
“I want to watch.”  
“No.”  
“Why not?”  
“Go back to bed.”

Jaskier said nothing else. He stood still for maybe half a minute, then followed silently away from the village. Geralt thought for a moment. If he pretended he couldn’t hear Jaskier, Jaskier would keep quiet, or quiet-ish, but he would probably continue to follow. And likely get himself killed.  
“Do you think I can’t hear you?”  
“Geralt, I want to watch a master tradesman at his work. Is that so strange?”  
“It’s dark.”  
“I can see enough.” There was a soft thud. “Ouch!” Geralt heard Jaskier hop for a few strides. “Geralt, your descriptions of your fights… well, they leave a little to be desired. They don’t exactly paint a picture.”  
“What else is there to say?”  
“If I watch, I can show you what I can do with the story. See here. If I climb the tree, you said they’re burrowers, and burrowers can’t get you if you’re in a tree.”  
“They can’t hear you from beneath the ground and burst up under your feet. They can still drag you out of the tree from above ground, bash you in the head, and pull you in to the water.”  
“But they’ll all be looking at you.” Jaskier was already climbing the tree, not very well.  
Geralt sighed heavily. “On your own head.”  
“Of course.” Jaskier said. “I’ll be very quiet. You won’t even know I’m here. Go and… Witch.”

Geralt thought, again, about dragging Jaskier out of the tree and getting rid of him, but unless things went badly wrong it shouldn’t matter too much. If Jaskier kept his mouth shut. If.  
There was just the first hint of pallor to the East sky. If he was going to do this, he should do this now. Geralt walked out on to the soft mud of the slope down to the water and stopped about five feet from the edge. This was what the rake was for. Drowners detected even slight changes in their home waters, but they weren’t that clever. Geralt downed the Swallow potion, grimaced, and started to poke the rake in to the silt at the edge of the water. All he had to do was be patient. They would come.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If anyone is interested, I'm fairly poorly versed in Witcher lore, I'm only a Netflix watcher, but I spent many enjoyable hours plundering the wiki, so all the monsters Geralt mentions exist in world, and all the potions work as they do in the games... with a little bit of give in the toxicity mechanics for realism.


	4. Mariboe's monsters

Geralt made no effort to track time as he stirred up the silt at the water’s edge. The nausea from the potion wasn’t too bad. He kept his eyes on the ground and his ears trained. 

Then it happened. He saw something moving in the silt. He dropped the rake and drew his silver. The first drowner’s head broke the surface just as Geralt’s sword cleared the scabbard. It had expected to be right under a creature’s feet. Geralt’s sword met its neck before its arms were out of the muck. Blood jetted straight up and the head toppled off backwards in to the water. The second one gave an unearthly wail and leapt at Geralt. Geralt had been expecting that, and just stepped aside, slashing at its flank as it fell past him. It turned back to him, still wailing, and swung claws at him. He parried, drawing blood. It did it again. And again. The third time, Geralt took its hand off at mid forearm. Drowners didn’t bleed much though. When it lunged with its remaining hand, Geralt took the hit and used the moment of closeness to gut the creature. He stepped back. 

It took the drowner a minute or so to die, thrashing and panicking in the mud. Geralt did not put it out of its misery. Its thrashing would make it hard for any other drowner to find him by his footfalls. His armour had taken the brunt of the claws. He didn’t think his skin was broken. He had a bruise maturing across his ribs, that dull sensation between itching and pain. Swallow brought the bruise out faster. It would look days old by sunrise. 

Stepping very gently, Geralt backed up the slope a few paces, taking a guard stance. He heard Jaskier whoop behind him.  
“This isn’t over.”  
Then two burst from the ground beside the gutted one. Geralt dashed forward, slipping on the mud, and drove the point of his sword between the ribs of the nearer. It grabbed for him. So did its mate. He backed up, parrying. The thing was to keep moving, not let them get around him. Even across this kind of terrain, he could back as fast as they could come at him. He did not change tactics: parry their claws and let them wear their hands to ribbons against his silver, watch for them throwing their full weight against him and dodge. One of them tried to grab his sword. He pushed up in to the grip. It screamed. The hand was almost cut in two. It leaped at him. He threw himself back, meaning to roll, but slipped and fell flat on his arse. It still missed him, somehow. The other made to throw itself on top of him, pin him. Geralt rolled away, feeling two clawed hands rake across his back. The ground by his hand bubbled. Geralt scrambled away again, and made it to his feet. Another one emerged, then another.   
Four was too many to dodge and parry. This needed something else. Geralt stopped running, let the first two close to grasp at him with clawed hands. He drew a breath, stretched his left hand out to full span, and flexed his first finger.  
Igni  
Fire burst from the space just above his palm, arcing forwards, all four drowners were close enough. Four voices before him screamed. He blinked against the heat as he cut down the first drowner, burning, flailing against the power of his Sign. The two behind were fleeing, heading for the water to put themselves out. He clove the chest of the second drowner open and followed them. He hit the water only a moment after them, panting, and slit the side of the nearer. The other rounded on him so he did not finish the kill.   
He backed away, guarding again, and cutting their hands to ribbons with each parry. The wounded one was faltering. Time was on his side now, not theirs. He could feel Swallow erasing the marks on his body, making them burn and itch, but he knew those muscles would not fail if he tested them, and his second wind was growing. He had enough to cast a sign again, but he didn’t need to. One drowner and a dying drowner were not a threat. One leaped at him to pin him. Geralt didn’t dodge. He braced and let the creature fall on to the point of his sword. He kicked himself free of the corpse as the second one screamed in panic. It had hold of him before he was off the ground, but that was the one he’d half-gutted earlier. His sword was still trapped in the freshest corpse. He punched, bare handed. The scream changed pitch, Geralt was up to his wrist in the thing. He’d caught it in the wound. Without thinking, he opened his fist and grabbed, for anything, and reached down for his sword. The screaming drowner came with him. Something burst in his left hand as he got hold of the sword with his right. That one he did try to behead, but did it badly.

Geralt did not let go of his sword. He shook his left hand, clods of drowner gore flew off, but he still felt filthy. He picked his way over the bodies down the slope towards the river to rinse his hand. He did not let go of his sword. He crouched by the edge of the water and sunk his left hand in to the cold water, half way to the elbow letting the water carry the gore off his armour too.   
Then it happened. A hand grabbed his hand and pulled him forward in to the shallow water, face first. He didn’t pull back, just tried to get his sword in the way. Whatever his sword hit wriggled. He pulled his head clear of the water and spluttered against the cold. Then the thing pulled him under again. Drowners. He pulled back in to shallower water and rolled, trying to drag it with him, he’d wounded it once, he could see it was bleeding, but they were too close for sword work. He kicked it away and slashed downwards again. The water didn’t help. He took a patch of skin off its ribs, but no more than that.   
It let go of him. He would not let it get away. He jumped back in to the water after it.

Jaskier suddenly couldn’t see anything at all. Geralt had gone down to the water’s edge, maybe half a minute later there had been a sudden flurry of splashing, then Geralt had jumped fully in to the river and disappeared. The current hid any movement. Jaskier suddenly found his desire for a story competing with his desire to stay alive. He could follow his Witcher down, and hopefully see what was happening, but he’d risk being dragged in to the fast-moving, very cold water by those things.   
“Oh, come on Geralt.” He said quietly. “Come on, come on.”  
Then something broke the water, more than half way across the river. Jaskier saw it shake ribbons of water off long silver hair as it rose, standing waist deep in the water. Jaskier whooped as Geralt started to wade for shore.  
“Keep quiet!” He barked. Well, Jaskier hadn’t really expected Geralt to take the applause and bow. He’d get a lot of water up his nose if he did. As Geralt neared the shore, Jaskier could see the corpse he was dragging. Another one of those things. Did that make seven on one?   
Even at this distance, Jaskier heard Geralt growl with effort as he slung the body ashore, saw him shake himself like a dog, and trudge ten paces up the slope before turning and taking what looked to Jaskier like a ‘ready’ stance with his sword.  
Jaskier waited.  
And waited.  
Until the sky was turning gold in the east, birds were starting to sing, and Jaskier was frozen stiff, too stiff to write anything down.  
“Geralt,” He called, “do you think that’s it now?”  
Geralt looked round. “Probably.”  
“Do you want me to fetch Roach?” Geralt frowned. “To help bring the bodies back to The Reeve. He’ll want proof, won’t he?”  
“I was going to bring him here.”  
“You’re being paid per body, aren’t you? Unless everyone in the town sees seven bodies, the Reeve can come here, count seven, go back to town and insist he only saw six, then its your word against his, and if he’s been smart enough to make someone move a corpse while that’s going on-”  
Geralt sighed heavily and nodded. “Get Roach then.”  
That, of course, was not Jaskier’s motive, but nearly an hour sitting still in a tree watching Geralt stand still by the water was plenty of time to concoct a reason for The White Wolf to trek back in to town in full view of everyone with an impressive number of corpses… and, of course, appropriate fanfare.


	5. Mariboe's song

Geralt had piled up the bodies by the time Jaskier got back with the horse. The horse planted her heels about twenty paces from the pile and refused to move closer, until Geralt came and took her reins from Jaskier.  
“They’re dead now, Roach. You’re far too sensible to worry about dead monsters, aren’t you?” The horse started moving. “I thought you were. Good girl. Good girl, stand now. Stand.” Geralt spoke more tenderly to the horse than he did any human. 

Roach ended up with five of the things stacked precariously on her back, Geralt had one over each shoulder. Jaskier had managed not to end up with any. It was also fortunate that neither Geralt nor Roach could move quickly so heavily burdened. Jaskier followed a few paces behind the horse. This was perfect. Geralt was soaked, the sun was up and the town was awake. Jaskier hummed gently to warm his voice until they came within thirty paces of the edge of the town.  
“Toss a coin to your Witcher,” Even at this distance, Jaskier heard Geralt huff, and ignored him.  
“O valley of plenty, O valley of plenty, O  
Toss a coin to your Witcher,   
O valley of plenty!

He wiped out your pest  
Got kicked in his chest  
He's a friend of humanity  
So give him the rest

That’s my epic tale:  
Our champion prevailed,  
He defeated the drowners,   
Now pour him some ale!”  
Then he just looped the chorus. It didn’t take long for other voices to join him. By the time Geralt got to the Reeve, there was a chorus of maybe thirty voices, mostly in tune.  
Geralt didn’t even have to knock. The Reeve opened the door, Zofia peeking over his shoulder, and stared. Geralt sort of shrugged and dropped both corpses off his shoulders.   
“Seven.” He said. The Reeve stepped out and looked over Roach as Geralt started pulling corpses off her back and on to the ground.   
“Is… Is that all of them?”  
“Best I can tell. I’ll take my coin now.”  
Jaskier spun on his heel, drew a breath and mouthed.  
“One, two, three-”  
“Toss a coin to your Witcher-” Half the crowd was with him by the time he sang the first word. Geralt looked at him with more incredulity than irritation, which Jaskier took as a victory. They kept it up until the Reeve reappeared, having left Zofia staring awestruck at Geralt in the doorway, and handed Geralt a heavy coin purse. Geralt weighed it in his hand.  
“Thank you.” He made to walk away.  
“What do we do with these?” The Reeve asked, gesturing to the bodies.  
“Whatever you please. If you string them up by the river, other drowners will cut them down, if there are others. If they’re still there by morning, it’s all over.”

Geralt tried again to walk away, leading Roach. She was covered in gore, he owed it to her to fix that. Only Jaskier followed him this time.   
“Where are you going?”  
“Back to the water.”  
“Do you think there are more?”  
“No.”  
“So why-?”  
“If you want to help me clean my horse, stick around.”  
“You’re not going to disappear again, are you?”  
“Unless I have somewhere to disappear to, probably not.” It would probably be at least a day before anyone dared throw things at him in this town.   
“Fair enough. I’m going to go back to bed then.” Jaskier hadn’t gone to bed in the first place.

For the first time in probably a couple of years, Geralt of Rivia found himself in a town that seemed to like him, with coin and at least a couple of days to burn. He should make use of that. His first task was to groom his horse, properly. He took her down to the ford, it took a bit of coaxing, but he did get her knee deep in the water. He splashed it up over her flanks and her neck, where the blood was drying, lifted her feet from the water one by one and pushed all the mud he could off them with his thumbs. He led her out and let her graze while he scrubbed his armour – blood would rot the studs away if he left it. The sun had mostly dried Roach by the time he’d finished. He gathered a handful of grass from the bank, twisted it in to a rope, then in to a wisp, and worked over Roach’s body, laying her mane, pushing whatever water he could out of her coat.   
When he was satisfied, and he was starting to dry, he started back towards the inn.  
“Witcher!” Someone called out to him from one of the hovels on the edge of town. He looked. A woman, bent backed, missing at least four teeth, and walking as though she thought her pants were about to fall down, was hurrying towards him, a burlap bag in her hand. He stopped and looked at her. “Witcher, the pig boy, one of the first ones those mons’ers killed.” Geralt waited. “He was my boy. My las’ one.”  
Geralt didn’t know what to say, didn’t know what she wanted. “I’m sorry for you.”  
That clearly wasn’t it. The woman kept on. “No one was payin’ much mind back then, but I’d los’ my boy, so I was. I got no coin to give you for what you done, but I got these.” She waved the sack at him. Geralt looked at it. “Best I can do, an’ I saw you had an ‘orse. For her if not for you.” She handed the bag to him. Geralt looked inside it, then closed it before Roach saw what he had. Yellow fodder beet. Slightly wrinkled, they’d probably been picked for six months, but stored sensibly. They were getting hard to come by, and Roach would appreciate them on the road. He looked back at the woman. He felt… uneasy about taking something from someone so obviously dirt poor, but she’d done this freely.  
“Thank you.”   
The woman dropped a clumsy curtsey and went back to her hovel. 

Next was swords. Geralt asked about until he found the smith (people were surprisingly civil to him) and haggled for having his steel sharpened again, and for permission to use the forge to tidy up his silver. The silver needed it more. Silver was a stupid metal to use for a weapon. It was far too soft and far too fragile to keep an edge, and it was impractically heavy. The blade was notched, and slightly bent at the tip. Geralt heated it red and set to work. He was nearly done before he noticed the smith watching him.  
“Is it true that a Witcher’s second sword is silver?”  
Geralt nodded. “Needs a different hand to steel.”  
“Who forges them?”  
“Nobody now.”  
“So what happens if you lose that sword?”  
“I’m probably dead.”

Geralt made his way back towards the inn, starting to think about food.  
“Witcher.” He turned. “Have you eaten?” A man was calling out to him, from the shade of a shopfront. One glance, one breath of a scent, this was the baker, whose wife had been taken.  
“No.”  
“Here, then.” He threw something to Geralt. A loaf, Geralt realised as he caught it. “Do Witchers eat?”  
“How much?”  
The baker shook his head, wiping his hands on his apron. “Just… drink to Lutia tonight, and the wife she was.” He turned away quickly, Geralt caught a faint tang of salt on the air. 

He kept on through the afternoon. He had Roach shod, he scoured the ground round about for White Myrtle. If he could find some, he’d have the basis for an excellent Golden Oriole potion with what he already had. He gave up after a couple of hours and settled for a mediocre Golden Oriole. By the time he’d finished that, the sun was sinking and people were heading towards the inn.   
Jaskier was having a fine time.  
“Well I went to her house on the top of the hill  
When the moon was shining clearly  
She arose to let me in  
But her mother chanced to hear me-” Singing and playing for a growing crowd, dancing on a table where everyone could see him. Geralt intended to sneak past, get a drink, and sit in the corner until he felt like going to bed. Predictably, that didn’t work.   
“Will you marry me now, my soldier boy?  
Will you marry me now or never-  
It’s the man of the hour! Someone pour him a drink!  
Will you marry me now, my soldier boy,  
Can’t you see I’m done for ever?”

Someone put a mug of ale in his hand, another was set on the table beside him. Someone else led him by the elbow to join Jaskier’s throng. Geralt wanted none of it. It was too many people packed in too tight, too warm, too close, and too loud. Just Jaskier, he’d learned to tolerate. This many voices pressed in, singing about him, about lost love, secret trysts, whatever Jaskier started them on. They were eating out of his hand. Every so often, Jaskier would entreat the crowd to buy Geralt more beer, and he’d get pushed back in to the middle of it. He wasn’t sure how to get out of this without causing a fistfight.  
Over what felt like hours, Geralt slipped away to the bar. He needed to not be in here and not be followed, but he wasn’t ready to sleep.   
“Have people stopped buying you drinks, Witcher?” The barman asked.   
“Lina.” Geralt said, simply. That ought to keep people from bothering him. And he had the coin, and, now the thought was in his head, the desire.   
The barman looked at him. “I have other whores, Witcher.”  
“I asked for Lina.”  
The barman hesitated, then. “I’ll go and see.”

Geralt glanced round. Jaskier had invited a girl up on to the table with him, and seemed to be acting the song out against her.   
“But her father spoke up sharply,  
‘You will do as I command,   
You’ll get married-’”Straw coloured braids, fair, smooth skin, and a heart shaped face. Geralt sighed. That was The Reeve’s girl. Nobody was paying him any mind either way.  
The barman came back. “She’ll have you, come on.” Geralt followed the barman out. He heard a call that might have been directed at him and ignored it. “Four for the room?”  
“Now?”  
“You didn’t pay me last time.”  
“I paid you late. I did pay you.”  
“You paid me late.” Geralt handed over the coin. The barman opened a door, seemed to think about pushing Geralt through by the shoulder blades, but seemed to think better of it. Geralt stepped in, ducking the lintel, and felt the door slam shut behind him. Lina stood up as she entered, her long black curls loose over her shoulders.

“The White Wolf came back.” She dropped a low curtsey and tilted forwards with it. The movement seemed calculated to let him see down her dress. She smirked up at him and took a step closer.   
“Same as before?” Geralt asked.  
“So very direct. Full fee for the night, no bar but pain?” She waited for him to reply for a second. “Twenty.”  
Given what the Reeve had paid him, he didn’t object. He stepped up to her and settled his hands on her waist. She drew breath slowly, as though she was considering what to do in return, then she twisted out of his grip.  
“Wash before you come to bed.” She sat down on the edge of the bed to wait for him.   
Geralt started undoing his armour. “I’ve been in the river today.”   
“Yes, with those… things. I doubt they’re very clean. The water’s there.”  
He turned his back on her to face the water. “Where does this town get its water from?”   
He heard her move, he knew it was coming before she slapped him across the arse. He could have stopped her, but it didn’t hurt. “Wash.” He did as he was told. He was out of the bar, and the prospect of Lina for the night was a pleasant one.   
“Did you find that Witcher who’d run away from his contract with the coin?”  
“Dead.”  
“You killed him?”  
“No, the thing he’d been hired to kill. King didn’t want people to know it had eaten a Witcher, so…”  
“Is it dead now?”  
“It’s no danger.”  
“But it’s not..?”  
“She’s human again.” Which, thinking about it, didn’t mean she was no danger. She’d be a queen, but she’d lived as a monster for years. Not his problem. Not now, anyway. He glanced over his shoulder at Lina. She’d stripped completely in the time it had taken him to get his armour and sword belt off. It was her job, though.   
That was the matter at hand. He’d paid for her, he’d make use of her. He pulled his shirt over his head.  
“Fuck, you’re bruised!” Geralt glanced down himself. He was dappled across his ribs. “What did that?”  
“Drowners.” He said, turning to the water to wash.   
“But they look days old.”  
He glanced at her again. “Witcher.”


	6. Oxenfurt's travails

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW: Passing reference to rape

The door opened. Geralt jumped to his feet. He heard Lina gasp in shock and fright. He’d been asleep. He was making for his blades without even a thought.   
Then his senses caught up with his body.   
The creature standing in the doorway was not a Drowner or a Bruxa. It was a bard, speaking.  
“Geralt, there’s a herald here from-” Jaskier seemed to realize that he was unwelcome. He stopped abruptly. “What are you doing with her?” Or perhaps that wasn’t what had shut him up.  
“What does it look like I was doing?” Geralt snarled. “Get. Out. Unless there’s a fucking Wyvern on the roof.”  
“There’s a herald here from Oxenfurt. Says they’ve been sent out to all the country round about to look for a Witcher.” As Geralt’s wits came back, he caught a breath of Jaskier’s scent. He reeked of drink. He clearly hadn’t been to bed yet, and he’d been drinking solidly since mid afternoon. He would regret it in the morning.   
“Well,” Lina said, shuffling herself in to a sitting position, holding a blanket against her chest. “go and tell the Herald that The White Wolf is here, but he’s earned his rest for the night. The Herald can do likewise, Minka has very clever hands, and The White Wolf will talk to him in the morning.”   
Jaskier giggled. “And what’s your name, pretty lady?”  
“Lina.” She offered a hand to Jaskier, who took it, then seemed to feel Geralt’s stare, and let go.   
“Out.” Geralt repeated, making towards Jaskier. Jaskier retreated, unsteady on his feet, and shut the door behind himself. Geralt followed him up to the door. “Is there no lock?”  
Lina shook her head. “If I start screaming, someone has to be able to get in.”  
“Hm.” Geralt picked up his steel, scabbarded, and wedged the hilt against the cross bar of the door, the point of the scabbard in to an uneven floorboard. It wouldn’t do much, but it might give him a second’s warning next time. He looked back at Lina.   
“You coming back?” 

Geralt did not hurry to get up in the morning. Lina’s warmth was comfortable, even if he’d had all he wanted from her. She asked him if he’d be back as he armoured himself. He answered that he didn’t know. He made his way down to the bar, where he found a boy with the height of a man but not the breadth. The boy stood up as Geralt entered.   
It turned out that the boy knew little. Something was attacking people as they slept, sometimes they had time to scream, usually they didn’t. Geralt asked how they knew it wasn’t a man gone mad, the boy didn’t know. Geralt asked for how often the attacks were happening and how long they’d been going on for, the boy didn’t know. All he knew was what he’d said at the outset, and how much money the city was offering to get the problem sorted out. And it wasn’t nothing. Which made Geralt suspect either a high death toll, or a monster not sticking to the slums. Or a human gone mad. 

Jaskier staggered in to the bar mid-morning. It had, mostly, been an extremely good night, but his head was not enjoying today. And he didn’t seem to have been robbed, even though he must have been blind drunk. He asked the barman for a mug of beer and some bread, and for Geralt of Rivia. The barman just pointed out of the door. Jaskier stepped cautiously out in to the sunlight (it hurt, if anything, a little more than he’d been expecting) and, after a moment, saw a chestnut horse drinking from the common trough while a white haired brute of a man tacked her up. He wasn’t sure if the man glanced at him or not.  
“Are you going to…” He tailed off. He couldn’t actually remember where the herald had come from, or if he’d actually told Geralt or dreamed that… conversation.  
“Oxenfurt.” Geralt said. “Something messy.” His voice seemed louder than usual.  
“When are you leaving?”  
“Soon.”  
“Will you wait? I just… need something to eat.”  
“Hm.” That sounded like an affirmative. Good enough. 

Half an hour later, Jaskier felt no better, but had washed his mouth out, and had something in his stomach, which he hadn’t thrown back. He went back out to the yard and found Geralt sitting next to Roach’s head. He stood up when he saw Jaskier and just started walking, leading Roach in hand. He had waited though. Geralt could have ridden off for Oxenfurt at dawn. He’d chosen to wait.   
Jaskier followed, resigning himself to a miserable day’s walking. He hoped that whatever was waiting for them in Oxenfurt would make a good enough story to be worth it. For once, he was grateful that his companion was virtually mute. 

Jaskier did eventually begin to improve. By early afternoon, he felt he could do more than just trudge along at Geralt’s heels, so started trying to commit Geralt’s latest fight to verse, mostly in his head, because:  
“When Mariboe feared  
Dead hands in its river,  
Who should they call on  
But Geralt of Rivia?”  
“River doesn’t rhyme with Rivia. And drowners aren’t dead men.”  
He’d do better without Geralt’s input.

Geralt stopped briefly when Jaskier had one verse sorted and a second nearly there (seven was a pig of a word to rhyme, he’d have to find a way to not end a line with it). He set Roach to graze and pulled two pasties out of her saddle bags. He offered one to Jaskier.  
“Where did you get those?”   
“Mariboe.” Geralt said, as if stating the obvious.  
“Not like you to buy things like this.” Geralt usually subsisted on hard tack and what he could forage or hunt.   
“Didn’t buy it.” Geralt said, round a mouthful of pastry.  
Jaskier’s eyes widened. “You stole?”  
Geralt shook his head. “Baker gave them to me.”  
Jaskier’s slow, sore brain caught up. “He lost his wife!” He grinned. “There are benefits to being a hero.”  
Geralt, predictably, didn’t reply.   
“Did you pay the girl you were with last night?” Geralt gave Jaskier a look that told him plainly to shut up. Jaskier had never paid much attention to that look. “You probably could have had an honest woman if you’d tried. You probably could have had something from Zofia.”  
Geralt looked away, a sardonic grin on his face. “And be stoned for raping a virgin?”  
“I didn’t mean that you should force her!”  
“It’s what her father chooses to believe that matters, not what’s true. Witchers are easy scapegoats. Nobody cares if it’s a whore.” Jaskier stared at Geralt a long moment. He wanted to ask if that had happened to Geralt, if there was or had been a girl he’d loved, maybe he’d rescued her from something, maybe she’d given herself to him out of gratitude, in secret. Then they’d been found out, then a vengeful father, or maybe a suitor, or someone the girl was unwillingly betrothed to, that would be a better story, had run about the town crying that the Witcher had raped his daughter, so they came for him with stones. Geralt had been stoned at Blaviken, he’d heard. Did the two stories join up?   
There was at least two thirds of a song there in concept, but probably not one to compose in Geralt’s hearing, possibly not even mentioning Geralt directly. Asking anything about Blaviken tended to result in Geralt getting punchy.

It was five days to Oxenfurt on foot. Jaskier had hardened to traveling with Geralt over the years, but it had been a while and Geralt was much fitter than he was, and still would not even think about letting Jaskier have the horse.


	7. Oxenfurt's welcome

Geralt smelled Oxenfurt before he saw it, and he smelled the water before he smelled the town. It was a warm day and the wind was in the East. The estuary smelled strong. The rot of an entire river landed there. They would make it by nightfall if they were swift. 

The sun was setting by the time they reached the walls, the gates were closing and guarded. Geralt huffed. Not swift enough. Oxenfurt had been quite slack about closing its gates at full dark once upon a time.   
“Let me handle this.” Jaskier said. He jogged up past Geralt and called out. “Noble Guardsmen of Oxenfurt, you called for a Witcher! Fling wide the gates and let him in!” Much to Geralt’s surprise, the gates opened. Jaskier looked very pleased with himself. Geralt dismounted and followed Jaskier through.   
A guard stepped up as though to challenge Geralt, then seemed to think better of it.  
“Who do I talk to?” Geralt asked the man as he faltered.  
“Master Horacy Wanta.”  
“Where will I find him?”  
“In the Dworsala, an hour after dawn.” The man said quickly, shrinking back. Geralt turned and started to walk.

People were skirting him and Jaskier. They still responded to a Witcher in fear, but something else was off. The streets were quiet for a city at dusk, and nobody went alone. This was a city in fright.   
There were still inns and taverns open, clearly. Geralt could hear drunken voices from at least one direction. His best option at this moment was to find one and bed down for the night.   
Jaskier flung an arm in to his stomach. “Geralt, listen!” He breathed. Geralt listened. He could hear a dozen drunken voices, one woman singing, a cat yowling, a man and a woman arguing… Cities were like this. “I have to see this!” Jaskier set off at a run. Geralt followed, without really considering why. Jaskier had run thirty paces down the road and opened the door of a tavern called The Silver Bells before Geralt realized what he was hearing.  
“-the devil’s horns  
Minced our tender meat,  
And so cried the Witcher  
He can’t be beat!”

Jaskier was already through the door. Geralt gave serious thought to turning around and walking away, leaving the bard to it. But this place was also potentially food and shelter for the night. He’d find the stables.   
He passed the tavern by a few feet before he saw the stables. He put his head over the split door. Roach did the same. The smell was pleasant and clean, of horses, not their dung. Something moved in the dark beyond the door. A boy, maybe twelve, stood up.  
“Whadda you want?”  
“Have you room for a horse and a man for the night?”  
“Horse. You can’t sleep in the stable. You have to stay in the inn.”

Jaskier slunk along the wall beside the door and watched for a moment. It would be rude to just join in without listening for a moment first. The singer was a woman probably about his age, no lute. Corset and chemise, with her shoulders open, quite nice looking, and she carried herself with an easy confidence that had always appealed to Jaskier.  
“Toss a coin to your Witcher  
O valley of plenty, O valley of plenty, O  
Toss a coin to your Witcher,   
O valley of plenty!”  
He met her eye and touched his lute, asking her permission. She nodded.

“At the edge of the world  
Fight the mighty horde  
That bashes and breaks you  
And brings you to mourn.” It took him a moment to catch her key, she was up a tone from where he usually sang it.

“He thrust every elf  
Far back on the shelf  
High up on a mountain  
From whence it came.” She seemed fine with the lute, so he started singing, ringing his voice against hers. He’d been singing this for a while now, he’d imagined a lot of harmonies he never got to sing.

“He wiped out your pest  
Got kicked in his chest,   
He’s a friend of humanity,   
So give him the rest!” And she seemed to enjoy it. She leaned her voice in to his.

“That’s my epic tale  
Our champion prevailed  
He defeated the villain,   
Now pour him some ale!” 

When they’d finished the song, Jaskier saw a large, white haired man slink in by a different door.   
“Jaskier The Nightingale.” The woman said, waving to him to bow, which Jaskier did. Geralt, true to form, was taking food to the darkest corner.   
“And your name?”  
“Renata the Siren.”  
“Renata the Siren, will you allow me to share your stage tonight? I ask no coin, only the privilege of singing with one who has already offered me the sincerest form of flattery.”  
She smiled. She knew how to work a stage, this one. “How can I refuse? Do you know The Young Wife’s Lament?”  
“You’re singing that sort, are you? Key?”  
“This crowd has a dirty, dirty mind.” Somebody wolf whistled at her. Jaskier didn’t look quickly enough to see who. “Your song is the cleanest thing I’ve sung all night. A flat.”  
Jaskier gave her the first chord. Renata the Siren was an actress as well as a voice, she leaned heavily on the exasperation of the young woman who’d been married off to a man older than her father, and landed – without warning – in Jaskier’s lap when the verse came about the young wife sneaking away from her sleeping husband in to the arms of a young lover. Jaskier managed to keep the lute part going. Food came, and drink as the evening went on. Jaskier taught the crowd the Cintran one about the Fishmonger’s daughter (they loved it), Renata sang one he didn’t know about a port town whore – The Jewel of The Sea – but he figured out a lute part by the end of the first verse. 

Geralt went to bed. Jaskier was clearly having a fine time, Geralt had no interest in pursuing pleasure, not until the hunt was done. There was something unpleasant here. It was too loud for him to sleep well, but he would at least lie still and let himself go. The song the girl had been singing as Geralt had left, he was fairly sure, had been describing a succubus: ‘her gaze known to topple the strongest of men’, ‘once you have known her you’ll seek her again’. He might have pointed that out had it just been Jaskier, but in a crowded bar with two of them… no. He didn’t want the attention. He bolted the door, took his armour off, and settled down. The bed was clean enough. He didn’t feel things biting. There was no sense in speculating. All he could do was rest as best he could. 

Tips came thick and fast as the patrons of the bar got drunk. What worked best was either the lewdest songs, or songs that were conversation acted out between the two of them. It was hours before the bar began to clear, but Jaskier noted that even drunkards didn’t leave alone. Renata started to count up her coin. Jaskier sat down beside her to finish his drink.   
“It’d be unfair of me to take everything.” She said, sliding him a small handful of coin.  
Jaskier made to push it back. “I said I wouldn’t.”  
“If I insist?”  
“Very well.” He took a draft of beer. She was pretty, spirited, and clearly impressed with him. What could it cost him? “And where do you bed down tonight, Renata the Siren?”  
She looked at him from under her eyelashes. She knew what that implied. “Here, Jaskier the Nightingale. It is dangerous to spend the night alone.”  
“Well then,” He held her gaze a long moment. “perhaps you and I can shield each other from whatever vile creature The Witcher came here to slay.”  
“Perhaps we could.” She said, smirking. “But my bed already has one man in it. Three is a crowd.”   
Oh well. Jaskier chuckled and shrugged. “Take it as flattery then?”  
“Of course.” Renata stood up. “That white haired man who was under the stairs, isn’t there now. Was that him? Geralt of Rivia?”  
“Yeah.”  
Renata sighed. “I wanted to ask earlier, but…”  
“He can be a bit of a grumpy git some days.” Most days.   
“I wish him luck.” She made for the stairs. “And in all seriousness, Jaskier, it kills people in their beds. Don’t take a single room.”


	8. Oxenfurt's dead

A little under an hour after dawn found Geralt of Rivia striding towards the Dworsala, Jaskier at his heels.  
It took less than twenty minutes of asking about to find Master Horacy Wanta. Geralt had been expecting worse. He was shown in to a study on the first floor, where a portly, bespectacled man sat at a desk, looking haggard.  
“Witcher.” A pause. “The Night Watch told me you’d come. Did you hear anything last night?”  
“I heard drunkards singing.” Geralt replied, truthfully. He heard Jaskier draw breath as though to snipe back, but nothing followed.  
“It has happened again.”   
Geralt waited for a moment. “What is happening? How frequently? And for how long?”  
Horacy Wanta took a deep breath and nodded. “The first one we thought was a fight on the waterfront in fog, about three months ago. No body, just a huge amount of blood, and we asked all the hedge witches and healers in the area, no one came to them alive with such injuries. And ones like that still occur – no body, just bloodstains spattered for five paces in every direction.”  
“Why is this not a throat-cutter who’s taken to throwing his bodies in the river?”  
“Because sometimes there are bodies, and those bodies are rent in a way that cannot have been done by a human.”  
“Perhaps you are not familiar with all a human can do.”  
Horacy Wanta frowned and leaned forwards. “What do you mean by that, Witcher?”  
“Only that I’ve been in the world a long time. Humans are capable of a great deal. The bodies.”  
“You will see for yourself. There was another attack last night.”  
“How often?”  
“Every few days? Every week at most.”  
“Where are the bodies found?”  
“To start with, they were in the streets, in dark corners between buildings. But people got scared. Nobody walks alone after dark now. The last three have died in their beds.”  
“Doors forced?”  
“Yes.”   
Geralt breathed out slowly. Attacking people in their beds was odd behaviour for a human, even a human gone mad, but he wouldn’t say so until he’d seen the bodies. “Last night’s attack then.” 

Horacy Wanta summoned three guards to lead them across town to where the last attack had happened, and walked ahead between the guards, leaving Geralt and Jaskier to follow behind.  
“Any thoughts?” Jaskier asked.  
“Still not much to go on.”  
“But?”  
“Not drowners. Whatever it is, is very stealthy, or can pass as human, or is a human.”  
“You still think..?”  
“Did you never hear about The Nilfgaard murders?”  
“No.”  
“Humans are capable of a lot, given the right circumstances.”  
Geralt smelled the blood before they were in sight of the place, a tiny hovel by the waterfront.

“Two lived here.” One of the guards said to Geralt as he pushed the broken door open. “Husband and wife, children all gone.” The stench of blood hit Jaskier as soon as the door moved. He clamped his mouth shut and followed Geralt, who seemed unfazed, in to the tumbledown house.  
“Anyone scream?” Geralt asked.  
“One.” The guard replied. To the right was a dead hearth and a table. To the left was a bed and oh that was a lot of blood! Geralt padded forwards, still unfazed. There were streaks of it across the floor, running more than half way across the room, it was splashed to head height on the walls next to the bed, was that more on the roof beams?  
Geralt touched the window. The shutters swung free. The catch was broken. “Who broke the door?”  
“I did.” One of the guards said.  
“The window?” Nobody answered. “Good.”  
“What is it, Witcher?” The councilman asked.   
“Give him space.” Jaskier said. “Let him work.” This did two things. It gave Geralt thinking time, and it established Jaskier as his man, his sidekick. Which gave Jaskier status. Jaskier had long since given up on the idea of being the hero in his own stories. He did very well playing second fiddle to Geralt.  
Geralt didn’t immediately approach the blood-soaked bed. He paced, looking at the blood splatters, touching occasionally, saying nothing, just focused. Nobody questioned him again, and Geralt would be grateful for that, though he’d never say so. After a couple of minutes, he went to the bed. He pulled back a blanket drenched in blood, looked at it for a second, then looked at what he’d revealed. An old man’s body, as bloodstained as the bed. Jaskier didn’t care to get close enough to see more. He just stood back, trying to look just as unfazed as Geralt did; they did this together all the time.   
“Did you cover him?” Geralt asked the guards. One of them nodded. “Where’s his wife?” Nobody answered. “Hm.” Geralt turned the body over. “Hm.” He held up… Melitele, that was a hand. A hand and wrist of a human. “I doubt she’s alive.” Geralt put the hand down again, quite unceremoniously, and looked up. Jaskier followed his gaze. It was a low, rough mix of thatch and what looked like bits of boat. “How many have been found indoors?”  
“Eight now?”  
“And in buildings like this?”  
“Yes.”  
“And this man’s wounds are typical of the bodies you find?”  
The guard nodded. One of them was starting to look green. Jaskier was almost getting used to this.  
Geralt nodded once. “Ekimmara.”  
“What?”  
Geralt looked back at the body. “These are claw marks, not bites; they’re slashes not punctures, and they’re not paired. The claws are long, and the wounds are neck, armpits, groin, and wrist. Torso is untouched. Things that eat flesh usually go for the belly first. This thing wanted blood. It’s splashed everywhere, but it’s gone about trying to lick it up, it hasn’t pooled anywhere. It’s all just staining. It didn’t drop from above, so it isn’t a Fleder, and Garkains make more of a mess than this.” That surprised Jaskier. “Ekimmara.”  
“What is an Ekimmara?”  
“Lower vampire.” Jaskier said quietly.   
Geralt looked at him for a second, then addressed Master Horacy again. “I need two days to prepare, and the promise of fifteen hundred after the job is done.”  
“If it is a lower vampire, why-”  
“Lower doesn’t mean weaker or less dangerous.” Geralt said. “Just less intelligent, less restrained. Most higher vampires hide their presence for years or decades in a town, then move on and take a new name. You don’t even realize there’s a monster there. No idiot takes a fight with an Ekimmara lightly, not even a Witcher. Fifteen hundred.”  
“I offered you a thousand.”  
“Or you can wait for another Witcher. I know there was at least one other alive a week ago.”

“How did you know the Ekimmara was a vampire?” Geralt asked, as soon as they were done with the councilman.  
“You told me.” Jaskier said simply.  
“When?”  
“Mariboe, before you knew they were drowners.”  
“And you remembered.”  
“Yes.”  
“Hm.”  
“I do listen to you, Geralt.” There was a pause. “So what are the two days for?”  
“Vampire Oil, Kiss, Black Blood, and trying to find its lair.”  
Jaskier did a double take. “Kiss?”  
“It’s a potion.”  
“For what?”  
“Stopping bleeding.”  
“Ah. Yes, that follows. Can I come?”  
“If you must.”

Geralt had meant it when he’d said that no idiot went in to a fight with an Ekimmara lightly. They were not easy creatures to deal with. The bleeding they caused was extreme. They would strike for where there was a lot of blood close to the surface. And they healed. The healing speed of an Ekimmara, even from silvered wounds, made even a Witcher on Swallow seem to heal like a poxed old man. You had to hit them hard, and keep on hitting them until they stopped moving, then cut them to bits and burn the bits, while weathering the bleeding they’d inflicted. So Vampire Oil to hamper their healing, Kiss to stop him from bleeding to death, and Black Blood so that when Geralt was hurt, which he would be, the thing didn’t benefit from his blood.   
He started in the market, going stall to stall looking for bear or dog tallow and mandrake cordial. Jaskier found bear tallow, for more than Geralt really wanted to pay for it, but he needed it. He also picked up a small bottle of vodka. Black Blood was an awkward thing to brew, Kiss would work more or less whatever alcohol you used. Then he took Roach and went out of the city, scouring the meadows and hedgerow for white myrtle, wolfsbane, mistletoe, honeysuckle. That took up most of the rest of the day. He found honeysuckle in a hedge, and stood on Roach’s saddle to get at the mistletoe, wolfsbane was more of a challenge. He eventually found it a mile and a half downriver, its scent hidden by the stink of the water.  
Then he had to concede he did need to find an alchemist. He was not going to find mandrake just growing wild in this sort of country, even less likely to find raw phosphorus. But he managed to get hop umbels from a brewer.   
The alchemist, as alchemists always did, charged far too much for what he sold, but did have what Geralt needed. 

At first hint of dusk, the city changed. Shops closed their shutters and barred up their fronts, people hurried in to cover. If an Ekimmara wanted to get through a door, most of the doors on these houses wouldn’t stop it. It had taken those out alone while it could, the easy prey, then its prey had got wise, so it had adapted. The only thing that troubled Geralt was that Ekimmaras usually didn’t store their prey. They exsanguinated them, drank what they could, then slept it off. He’d heard of it before, but it did raise the question of where the bodies were going. Somewhere there was a pile of bloodless husks. If Geralt could find that, he’d have a much easier task. But he doubted he’d find it. Jaskier bothered the barmaids into letting Geralt sit by the fire to start brewing, then started doing as Jaskier did.   
Geralt started with Kiss, that was easier than the other two, and people would keep coming up and asking him if he could stop the thing that was killing them. To which he answered:  
“If people leave me alone and let me work.”  
Jaskier was, fortunately, drawing most of the attention, but Geralt did not trust himself to attempt Black Blood or Vampire Oil in this room. He bottled up the Kiss, took his supper, and went to bed, leaving Jaskier singing. He didn’t enjoy the expectant stares, people looking at him as though they were waiting for him to do something.


	9. Oxenfurt's streets

The morning was quieter. Only a maid in the bar, and she didn’t seem to want to talk to him. She gave him milk sops, but barely looked at him. Afraid of his wolf’s eyes.   
Geralt stoked up the fire and set to work. People came and went for breakfast, by the time Jaskier made it down, Geralt had almost finished the Vampire Oil. The consistency would be fine once it had cooled fully. By the time Jaskier was awake enough to approach him, Geralt had started on the Black Blood.   
“Geralt, is that brain?”  
“Hm.”  
“From what?”  
“The drowners.”  
Jaskier made a noise of disgust. “Why?”  
“Black Blood.”  
“Do you drink that?”  
“Hm.”  
Jaskier repeated the noise of disgust. “Dare I ask what it does?”  
“It will make the Ekimmara regret bleeding me before it dies.”

Drowner brain, drowner saliva, white vinegar, white myrtle, and hop umbels on a mandrake cordial base made Black Blood. Most Witcher potions would kill a human. Black Blood would kill them very quickly indeed, and in agony, Geralt didn’t relish the prospect of drinking it, but he could hear Vesemir in his head:  
“Never, ever take on a vampire without Black Blood. It will give you a breath while they realise what you’ve done, and even if they bolt, or if they kill you, they’ll be dead by sun up. Yes, better not be wounded at all, but even I rarely manage that. They will get you. Just make sure it burns them.”  
He ate as much as he could stand at midday, he wanted his stomach empty by the time he took Black Blood, then went out, wandering the streets and wondering how to make sure he met the creature. Jaskier didn’t follow. The problem really was the size of its hunting ground. In a village, Geralt could have gathered all the humans in to one or two buildings and guarded them. In a city this size, it wasn’t possible. Finding the creature’s lair would take far too long. The smell of the river made scent tracking nearly impossible, and Ekimmaras could move great distances when they wanted to. He spent a few fruitless hours trying to imagine where it would come to hunt, before  
“Geralt!” He turned to see Jaskier jogging down the road towards him. “Have you found the lair?”  
“No.”  
“Is this any good to you?” Jaskier held out a piece of paper. A map. “I had them copy this out for me, marking where all the bodies, or blood-ponds, have been found.”   
Geralt took it and studied it.  
“It’s not evenly spread, is it?”  
“Hm.” There was a strong bias towards the seaward end of the city, and tending towards the waterfront. Not enough to find a lair now, but… “I need blood.”  
“That’s… ominous. What kind of blood?”  
“Human. Fresh.”  
“Why?”  
“I need it to attack me. I won’t find it, but if I walk its hunting grounds alone and bloody, it’ll find me.” Geralt looked up. Cloud had rolled in from the sea and the light was starting to fade. It was nearly time. The trick would be to bloody himself as late as possible. He kept walking, mapping out the ground that the Ekimmara preferred, noting places it could hide, places he could back in to if it wasn’t going well, but Ekimmaras had a bit more sense than drowners, and many men. If a fight wasn’t going their way, they’d bolt. He might have to let it get a hit in early on and face the bleeding. The streets were starting to empty. He should take Black Blood. Jaskier was still following him.  
“Get away.”  
“Why?”  
“This thing can kill you.”  
“And the drowners couldn’t?”  
“An Ekimmara can kill you much faster than drowners can.”  
“I kept myself out of the way before, didn’t I?”  
“Hm.” The sky was darkening. He should take Black Blood. He should do it now. “If this thing gets hold of you, you’ll be dead before I get to you.” Geralt reached for the Black Blood.   
“But you need human blood.” Jaskier said. “And I’m guessing yours won’t do for some reason.”  
Geralt took a deep breath and downed the Black Blood, trying not to taste it. The worst was yet to come. “Hm.”  
“So how do you plan on getting human blood?”  
“I’m in a city.”  
“Are you just going to barge in to someone’s house and cut them?”  
Then he felt it. The nausea starting to build. It was going to get a lot worse before it got better. And if he vomited, he had to drink the other half. He tipped his head up as he felt the first heave. Head up, mouth shut, stand still.   
“Geralt?”  
He didn’t reply. He put his body through a lot, but even a body that had been through the Trial of the Grasses, and was used to the brutality of witcher potions usually tried to throw Black Blood.   
“Geralt, what’s happening?” Geralt retched. Nothing came up. This was why he hadn’t eaten since noon. “Geralt, what did you take?”  
“Black Blood.” He retched again. This was why he took Black Blood before he saw the vampire. He didn’t look at Jaskier. He kept his eyes skywards. This would ease. It wouldn’t pass completely until the potion wore off. But it would get to the point that he could move normally without losing his stomach. He retched again.  
“Is this… Is this normal?”  
Geralt nodded faintly. The movement made the nausea spike.   
“And does it do the same to the thing that bites you?”  
“Worse.”

It took a while. It always did, but it did pass. By the time Geralt dared walk, it was dusk. He and Jaskier were the only ones left on the street.   
“When do you need the blood?” Jaskier asked. Geralt stopped. Jaskier was right, getting blood from a stranger without starting a fight might be harder than he’d anticipated. And was Jaskier offering? “And how much?”  
“Only enough to smell. And not yet. When it’s full dark.”   
Jaskier nodded once. “Okay.” But if he was going to bleed Jaskier, he couldn’t send the bard away with a fresh cut with an Ekimmara prowling. Fuck. He’d have to keep Jaskier with him, and just hope the Ekimmara couldn’t tell which of them the blood had come from. 

They walked on. Geralt felt as though he had live snakes for guts, and the nausea only eased a little. He oiled his blade as they went. He had a passable map of the area by the time darkness fell. He stopped and looked at Jaskier, who nodded resolutely.  
“Okay.” He rolled up his left sleeve and offered his arm to Geralt. He looked away as Geralt cut him.   
“I don’t need much.” He cupped a hand under Jaskier’s arm and started to bloody himself, marking placed he could take Ekimmara claws and keep fighting; the fronts of his shins, the outside of his forearms. 

Something moved behind him. He turned. Jaskier clamped a hand to the cut. He drew his silver. He couldn’t see anything.   
“Geralt?” Jaskier breathed.  
“Keep still.” All he could hear was Jaskier panting behind him.


	10. Oxenfurt's monsters

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Worse than average language herein

Stillness. For what felt like minutes, nothing seemed to move. Then Geralt heard a footfall to the left, he pushed Jaskier away from the sound as it came, barreling out of the shadow of a house towards him. The Ekimmara. Small for its kind, making to rush him, keeping low. 

Geralt crouched to meet it. If he just dodged, he’d be offering Jaskier to it. He feinted to smash his sword down in to its head. It jumped. Geralt reversed the blade and tried to block, to throw it off and away. One of its clawed hands grazed Geralt’s face, the other raked down his left arm. He was bleeding. But not badly for an Ekimmara’s hit. The armour had taken most of it. He’d felt the blade bite, the Ekimmara squawked as it recovered itself.

Geralt followed it up. He slashed for its torso, it slashed for his. Geralt leaned back so his blade caught its forearm. It screamed. Its blood sprayed up his arm. It would heal. He kept on, driving for its guts. It recoiled. It was thinking about running. In the moment it turned, Geralt got a swipe across its belly. It ran. He chased.  
It fled back towards the waterfront. Fuck, it was fast. Very fast. And it hadn’t had a drop of his blood. It rounded a corner ahead of him. He followed. Where was it?

To his right. He saw it as soon as it moved and more or less got his sword up in time. It landed on the point of the blade, he felt himself take the full weight of it. Its claws missed his groin and raked up across his abdomen instead. Right through his armour. Half an inch deeper would have spilled his guts on the floor. Geralt growled and drew his sword free, feeling flesh tear as he did. He hurt, but he was less hurt than the Ekimmara. He could not give it time to recover. It staggered as his sword came clear. He slashed across. It didn’t react in time. It tried to pull back, but his sword caught it just above the hip and bit deep. He smelled as well as saw that he’d opened its bowel. 

It stumbled away. Geralt chased, slashing at its back and limbs. He was slowed by the wounds on his belly, but he was faster than it was now. The hole in its back from where it had impaled itself on his sword was closing, but there was gut hanging between its legs and the fresh wounds on its back were bleeding. 

It jumped off the edge of the waterfront. The tide was out. It slipped on the silt as it landed. It couldn’t have given him a better opportunity. Geralt jumped and landed on it, sword first, straight through the chest. The thing jerked and shuddered as Geralt’s sword sank through it and four inches in to the mud, with his full weight behind it. Geralt got up quickly. Even in death spasms, he didn’t want to take Ekimmara claws to the thigh.

Out of the corner of his eye, something moved behind him. Without thinking, he shielded his face with a forearm. He felt something wet and fleshy slap against his vambrace. He looked, drawing his sword out of the Ekimmara.   
A creature was advancing on him, it must have been under the waterfront, he wouldn’t have been able to see it until he was on this level. Milk white eyes, paunches of fat dangling off the front of her torso, but limbs like saplings in winter, and a long, green tongue which she was drawing back in to her mouth. A hag. A grave hag. 

“Fuck.”  
This explained the missing corpses. The Ekimmara killed for blood, the hag took what it left.  
Did he run? He was wounded and he’d been hired to kill the-

Pain burst across the top of his left leg. He looked down in time to see the Ekimmara drawing back a fistful of claws and lurching up to press its mouth to the wound.   
Geralt’s leg buckled, the pain spiked, and he fell on top of the Ekimmara. It wasn’t dead. He felt its teeth scraping across his wound. Geralt cried out again. It would die. The Black Blood would finish it off, but Geralt could feel blood coursing over his legs, as though the Ekimmara couldn’t drink it quick enough. Then the Ekimmara spasmed, started to gasp and choke. Geralt drove his sword in to it, lying half on top of the creature, its head pinned by his weight, it was far too weak to throw him. 

He made the first movement of trying to roll over, but this time he didn’t move fast enough.   
The wet, fleshy tongue of the hag hit him full across the eyes. Geralt bellowed in pain again and closed his burning eyes. Fuck.   
Fuck. He couldn’t stand, his sword was trapped under him, and he’d just been hit in the eyes by a grave hag. Fuck. His ears were ringing, from pain or from blood loss, but he heard the thing moving towards him. The Ekimmara was still twitching.   
“Kill my hunter, I kill you.”   
Geralt didn’t answer. He rolled and brought his sword in to something like a block, but she didn’t slash for his face. She stamped hard on his stomach, making him curl against the pain, but his leg didn’t really move. 

He opened his burning eyes.  
“Fuck.” He was blind. He couldn’t fight blind. He rolled back on to his front and curled up against the hag’s kicks, growling in pain as he did it. He couldn’t fight. He couldn’t defend himself.   
He covered his head and felt her land on top of him, clinging to his back. He felt claws raking against his armour. His ears were ringing. Strange lights danced in front of his sightless eyes. He felt her teeth scrape the back of his neck, then sink in. He cried out again as she pulled a mouthful of skin away, then the sting of her tongue at the wound. 

Black Blood.  
He heard her gasp, then start to choke. He had a silver dagger. He couldn’t wield a sword now, he was far too far gone, but he twisted in her grip and drove the dagger in to her stomach. She was kicking and scraping at him, his face, his hands, he just kept on. Stick. Twist. Draw. Stick. Twist. Draw. He wasn’t going to last. All he could do was make sure she didn’t either.


	11. Blood

Jaskier had heard Geralt scream, he’d got there just in time to see him fall down and be jumped by the second creature. He couldn’t run as fast as a Witcher could. Now there were three bodies in a pile on the ground, two of them still fighting. The Ekimmara hadn’t been alone.   
“Oh, come on Geralt.” Jaskier breathed. “Come on.” The clouds were thinning. There was a little more light now, but Jaskier still couldn’t tell how the fight was going. Geralt didn’t often choose to wrestle on the ground like that, which worried Jaskier.   
Then they stopped. At least one thing in the pile was breathing, but everything suddenly seemed very still. Only then did it occur to Jaskier the danger he might be in. If Geralt hadn’t won, he was possibly alone with a monster, in the dark, in a city he didn’t know well.   
Jaskier didn’t move. If he approached, and anything other than Geralt was alive, he’d die. If he called out, he’d tell anything down there that he was here.  
Then suddenly the pile shifted.

Geralt gathered his remaining strength and pulled himself forward, out from under the hag, with his one passable arm and his one good leg. He felt a sudden stabbing pain in his left side. Bleeding pain. He needed Kiss. He needed Kiss now. He was going to bleed to death. He retched. Nothing came up. But if he took Kiss now, he’d die. He would not survive that much poison and that much blood lost. He needed White Honey, and The Cat had given it to him. He ran a hand down his side to his pouch. The Cat’s bottle was a different shape. He should be able to do this by touch. He groped with shaking hands for The Cat’s bottle. He was still blind. Still blind and still bleeding like a stuck pig from the join between his leg and his body. He brought the potion up to his head, hissing at the pain the movement caused him, pulled the cork with his teeth and downed the White Honey. 

Something was crawling free. Jaskier strained his eyes in to the dark. The something had white hair and studded armour. Good. He jumped down on to the half dry silt and approached, skirting the unmoving bodies.   
“Well that was interesting.” No response. Not even a grunt or a sideways glance. “Geralt?” Jaskier stepped closer. He could hear Geralt breathing now, but that didn’t reassure him. Geralt was panting. Facedown and unmoving, he was gasping for breath. “Geralt?” Jaskier crouched and made to turn the Witcher over. Then he saw the blood. A lake of dark fluid pooling under Geralt’s body. Geralt unmoving and gasping. And Jaskier had heard him scream. “Okay. Okay. Geralt, I’m going to get help. Just… Stay there. Don’t worry. Just stay there.” Jaskier turned and ran. He knew nothing about wound binding, Geralt clearly needed help, and he was too heavy for Jaskier to move. 

He scrambled back up off the silt and kept running, swallowing past the knot in his throat. Guards. Guards would know. Where would guards be?   
There! Four of them holding two torches, and looking tense. They turned to him, drawing swords as he approached. He held his hands out. How to phrase this? He had to get urgency across to them, but he couldn’t make Geralt seem weak.  
“Hai!” Jaskier shouted as he came in to the circle of the torchlight. “Come. Quickly. The Witcher has vanquished the monster he was summoned to kill, and a second that attacked him, but he’s hurt to danger. Come.” He turned and started running back, hoping against hope that they’d just follow. Often if you gave uniformed men an instruction as though you expected them to follow it, they just would. 

They did. He could hear armoured men running after him. Thank Melitele. He jumped back down on to the silt. Geralt hadn’t moved. Was he still-? He was still breathing. Good. Two guards were right with him.   
“The White Wolf of Rivia?” One of them breathed. They turned Geralt over. He groaned. He was covered in blood. The torchlight made it easier to see. He was pouring blood from his groin. Jaskier flinched. That might end Geralt’s whoring.   
A hand seized his wrist. Jaskier pulled back without thinking, but Geralt was holding him fast, but not quite looking at him. “Kiss.” He took two heaving breaths. “Jaskier, Kiss.”  
“What the-?” One of the guards started.  
“It’s a potion. Where is it?” Geralt indicated his pouch with the other hand. Jaskier opened it. “There are two in here, Geralt, which is it?”  
“Blue.” Jaskier held both potions up in the torch light. One was red, the other was pale blue. Jaskier uncorked the blue one and shoved it in to Geralt’s mouth. Geralt swallowed it, then coughed and shook his head.   
“Why couldn’t you-?”  
“Blind.” Jaskier felt his mouth drop slightly open.   
“We’ll take him to Jinna.” One of the guards said. “She’ll know what to do. Help me up with him.” The other guard held out his torch to Jaskier. They each pulled one of Geralt’s arms over their shoulders and hauled him upright. Geralt groaned. More blood splashed on to the ground.   
“What are these things?” The other guards were inspecting the bodies.   
“I’ll explain later.” Jaskier said. “We need to get him out of here.” He picked up Geralt’s silver sword. It was heavier than he’d expected.

Geralt didn’t seem to be fully aware. Or if he was aware, he was just resigned. He wasn’t trying to carry his weight, he was limp across the guards’ shoulders, panting and grimacing. 

One of the guards who wasn’t carrying Geralt thumped on a door.  
“Jinna! Jinna, we have one for you!” There was a silence. Then Jaskier heard movement inside. A balding man opened the door, clearly in his nightgown.  
“What’s happened to ‘im?”  
“I didn’t see.” The guard said. “Very bloody though.”  
The balding man nodded and waved all six of them in.   
“It was an Ekimmara.” Jaskier said. The balding man looked at him quizzically, and pointed to a wooden table, that, in the flickering torchlight, seemed to bear a lot of bloodstains. The guards started to move towards the table. “The thing that’s been killing people here at night is an Ekimmara. The Witcher killed it, but it wounded him, badly.” Geralt hissed in pain as they set him down, then just lay there, panting.  
“How long since?” A woman’s voice. Jaskier turned to see a thick framed woman, with hair the same colour as Geralt’s, coming down the stairs, tying an apron on over what seemed to be a nightgown. Jinna, he presumed.  
“Less than half an hour.”  
Her apron was very stained, it looked as though years of bloodstains had been boiled out of it.   
“Right, let’s see ‘em then.”  
The four guards moved as though this was rehearsed. Two of them put hands on Geralt’s shoulders, as though to stop him from getting up, the other two started stripping him. Geralt grabbed one of them by the wrist, with that same, mad, powerful grip he’d used on Jaskier.  
“Burn it.”  
“Now stop that.” Jinna said, making to break Geralt’s grip.  
“The Ekkim-” Geralt broke off, panting, staring blind in to space. “Burn it.”  
“They regenerate.” Jaskier said. Geralt had said that, hadn’t he? Ekimmaras are vampires and vampires regenerate. “If you leave them alone, they’ll heal. You have to burn it to ash.”  
“Albin, Teof.” One of the guards at Geralt’s shoulder said. “Go.”  
“Which one’s the Ekki-”  
“The one with the huge claws, not the one with the huge tongue.” Jaskier said. The steadier light showed how pale Geralt was, and there was an odd blue sheen to his eyes. He’d gone limp again. He hadn’t corrected Jaskier, but Jaskier wondered whether he’d heard. He heard the door open and close as two guards left.   
“We’ll manage just us.” Jinna said. “He’s not putting up much of a fight, is he?” Jaskier put Geralt’s sword down. He could imagine that Geralt might resent being pulled about by strangers. Had he just passed out? His eyes were open, but he’d gone very still. But he was breathing. He was still breathing.   
“Hey.” Jinna tapped Geralt on the chest. He was so covered in blood it was hard to tell where the blood was coming from. He didn’t respond. “Witcher.” She pinched his bottom lip. He pulled his head out of her hand. She put a hand on his chest. “You with him?” She asked. Jaskier nodded. “Heart’s not racing.” She said. “If they come in this pale and this flat and their hearts aren’t racing, they usually die.”  
Jaskier drew a breath. “He’s a Witcher. They get better. If you give them a chance, they get better.” He assumed that was true. And if it wasn’t true, it would persuade the woman to try.


	12. What are friends for?

Geralt shifted. Pain shot through his groin and across his belly. He growled.  
“Afternoon.” Geralt opened his eyes and turned his head. Jaskier was sitting sprawled across a wooden chair, a book on his lap and a pencil in his hand, looking at him. “Was wondering when you were going to wake up.”  
“What time is it?” His voice was hoarse. He was lying on a cot. The room was small, two walls wood, two stone, ceiling plain boards, one door in the opposite corner to his cot.   
“A bit after noon.” Jaskier replied, stashing his pencil in his belt like a dagger.   
“Where…”  
“It’s Jinna’s… I think calling it an ‘infirmary’ is generous. It’s where the Hedge Witch stashes people who she doesn’t think are fit to be turfed out. Do you remember how you got here?”  
Geralt shook his head, braced himself for pain, and hauled himself part way in to a sit against the wall. And it did hurt. Where he’d expected and his right shoulder.  
“Fuck.” He’d not noticed it before. It was hot and throbbing. He lifted a hand to it. That hand, at least, didn’t hurt. His shoulder did. “I remember the hag jumping me. Everything after that’s…”  
“Fuzzy?” Jaskier suggested. “And you didn’t say what she was last night, thank you for that.” He took his pencil out again and wrote something down. “You were blind and you couldn’t walk.” He remembered that much. He remembered being face down in the muck, bleeding out, brawling with the hag, and knowing that he wouldn’t be able to tell which potion was which by touch. How had he got out of that? “I got some help moving you, gave you Kiss, got you here, Jinna cleaned you up, the bleeding had stopped, Jinna did some Hedge Witch-y stuff, she said you’d wake up or you wouldn’t.”  
“The Ekimmara.” Geralt said. He hadn’t dealt with the body. The things could regenerate from multiple through sticks given time, even with Black Blood inside them.   
“Burned to ash and scattered in the river.” Jaskier said calmly. “I got the guards to do it, but they kept that for you.” He pointed with his foot to a severed, clawed hand, which was lying behind the door. “I did go to Master Wanta this morning and see if I could get the payment, but he said he’d only release it to you, which may or may not have been him hoping you’d die of your injuries and he wouldn’t have to pay. He’ll be disappointed.”  
“Hm.”  
“You don’t look like you’re going to die anymore.”  
“Where’s Roach?”  
“Jinna’s sister lives about a hundred yards that way-” Jaskier pointed. “-and she had a horse until about a week ago, some maudlin tale about founder, so she’s got a stable free. She saw the poetic merit in her sister nursing the wounded Witcher while she looked after his horse.” Jaskier swallowed. “Though I can’t imagine you riding for a bit, not with… that where it is.” Geralt grimaced at the thought.  
He looked at Jaskier for a long moment. If he’d just stayed in the silt of an estuary, collapsed and bleeding, he would have died. Even if he hadn’t bled to death, he would have drowned in the tide. “Thank you.”  
Jaskier shrugged. “What are friends for?”  
The door opened. A woman appeared. Taller than Jaskier, and probably old enough to be his dam, and wearing an apron that had probably once been white. She had an iron charm about her neck. This, presumably, was the Hedge Witch.  
“Ah. I thought I heard a voice I didn’t know. This one talks a lot, doesn’t he?” She said, gesturing to Jaskier. “He wasn’t wrong though, Witchers don’t die easily. I thought you’d bleed to death out of the one in your thigh. Now, let me look at you, then you can eat and drink.”

**Author's Note:**

> Please review. AO3 is a new environment for me and I'm still feeling it out


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